


north, south, east, west

by dovahfiin



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Last Jedi - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Cheeky Luke Skywalker, Consent, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Flyboy with feelings, Force-Sensitive Leia Organa, Gentleness, Grief/Mourning, Leia is a cougar, Luke Doesn't Die, No Fluff, None whatsoever, Not solving things by getting into an X-Wing and blowing stuff up, Older Woman/Younger Man, Poe Dameron Hurts So Prettily, Porgs! - Freeform, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Protective Poe Dameron, Realistic descriptions of middle age bodies, This is sweetness and light
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-03-19
Packaged: 2019-04-04 19:50:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14027517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dovahfiin/pseuds/dovahfiin
Summary: After arriving to Ahch-To to regroup what remains of the Resistance and reconnect with Luke, Leia reams Poe for his negligence under the late Admiral Holdo's command. Poe knows the real reason why the General hides behind the guise of a formal reprimand. Luke is amused as history repeats itself.





	north, south, east, west

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. There are simply too many ways in which Poe Dameron resembles Han Solo to NOT go there.  
> 2\. I couldn't get this out of my head even though I'm working on two other projects right now on AO3. Sorry 'bout it.  
> 3\. I have non-gay man feelings for Leia Organa. It's gotta be that high collared jacket she wears in TLJ.  
> 4\. This is one in which Luke lives beyond his Force projection on Crait, so AU tags apply.

  


The reunion at Ahch-To would have made him weep, were he the crying kind. As he isn't, he watches Luke Skywalker, legend and Jedi Master, sweep his sister into a hug that would have rivaled an embrace from Chewie. The General is twenty years younger in that moment, the sun from a break in the otherwise rainy clime of the island washes them all out. Rey looks like an angel, actually smiling, and R2-D2 reverently beeps as the reunion of the millennia unfolds before his eyes.

  
  


What does one say in such a moment? Poe has served with beings of uncommon valor throughout his time in the Resistance, though this is Luke Fucking Skywalker, liberator of the Rebellion and destroyer of Death Stars. He's seen the schematics of the old battle station, knew how impossible that one-in-a-trillion shot had been. He finds himself disbelieving of the strange power Rey shares with Luke, reticent to see anything other than statistics and hard facts. He has to live in that black and white; it's the only way he will survive. It's the only way the Resistance will survive, but he watches Luke's eyes redden and practically flood the tiny island with tears of joy and elation. His sandy-silver hair is matted to his head, the exertion from the Jedi trick he employed on Crait obviously wearing on him even then. Leia raises one shaking hand to cup his cheek; he can practically feel that feathertouch himself.

  
  


The moment is over as quickly as it began. General Organa - Leia - starts barking orders. Their number, small but once again propelled by hope, begin to move and work and do what it is they're best known for: surviving. Persevering.

  
  


"Dameron, you're on mess duty." She gestures to the Caretakers, squat little things that look like some sort of amphibious rodentia. "Help them. They're used to cooking for just Luke, and we've just surprised them with a dozen other mouths to feed."

  
  


Poe nods, walking toward what appears to be the main structure dedicated to domestic duties. He winces, remembering his actions aboard the _Raddus_. He would have done it all over again if given the chance; if it managed to spare just one of the Resistance casualties, it would have still been the right thing to do. He doesn't even know what the right thing to do is anymore, so he picks up a primitive-looking knife and, looking around to make sure no one can spy his indignity, begins to work.  


  


He peels potatoes. It's a fitting punishment and one he was certain was given to him on purpose, because he had to think. Not sit in a cockpit and trust his training and, what's more, his instincts to deliver him from a problem. He clumsily holds the small paring knife, designed for hands far less dexterous than those of humans, and cuts himself three times before he hears the door open and measured footsteps enter. A small pile of his culinary triumph sits to his right, mocking his efforts. A sigh pushes itself through the silence from behind him.

  
  


"You know, I'm not the one making an example of you. You've done a fine job of that yourself."

  
  


"I know. I wanted to apologize for my mutiny aboard the _Raddus_." It's a half-truth and Leia knows it.  


  
"Will wonders never cease." Poe turns around just as the General sits down, primly folding her hands in her lap. She's tired, though it doesn't show anywhere in her body language or on her face. The adrenaline from the showdown on Crait and a brilliant escape is still firmly planted within all of them. He imagines it will guide them through what remains of the day, and that sleep may perhaps come easily for the first time in weeks. Her high collar gives her the appearance of royalty - and he supposes she is, and he feels stripped bare.

  


  
"We need to discuss what happened on the _Raddus_."

  


  
"I only did what I thought you would want, Leia. You were unconscious in the med bay from living up to your surname, and Holdo -"

  


  
" _Admiral_ Holdo. You will give her the respect she is due even in death."

  


  
"Yes, Admiral Holdo. She wasn't thinking of the preservation of the Resistance."

  


  
"Fascinating. Then what were her motivations for slicing the _Supremacy_ in half when she could have done nothing and still been extolled as a hero?"

  


  
Poe stills. "I don't know. I don't know anything anymore. I know that the First Order is going to come knocking, and we have Luke but that isn't enough."

  


  
"As I told Rey, we have everything we need."

  


  
"I respectfully disagree."

  


  
The General stands, a strange combination of sadness - more than any Poe has ever seen in one person - move up her neck, through her eyes, until she essays a devastating, transparent _howdareyouspeaktomethatway_ no-holds-barred stare. He swears he feels one of his eyelids begin to melt.

  
  


"Do you have any idea what it is to go from commanding a thriving effort to stop the First Order, only to watch as every single person you have ever entrusted with responsibility, with duty, fall prey to the orders you give them? Do you know what it's like" she looks away then, her face softening and her eyes glistening even in the low light of the dank hut in which they stood "to lose a partner?"

  
  


"I know what it's like to sacrifice."  


  


"This is not sacrifice. This isn't so ambiguous. This is a loss of everyone you love, knowing that your decisions sealed their fate. All you've ever done is hop in an X-Wing and pray to the gods you aren't blown out of the sky. That's just sacrifice. Still difficult, still noble, but not the same."

  
  


Over a simple dinner, which is barely palatable because Poe is not a godsdamned chef, Leia's eyes are downcast. Even as Luke bolsters the morale of the remnants of the Resistance with bawdy Corellian whisky-soaked songs and winking at his sister, the mood is somber.  


  


Afterward, when twilight has long since been given to night and there is an admittedly brilliant blanket of stars overhead, Poe returns to the _Falcon_. He avoided Finn and Rey, who were charmed by Luke - although Rey had fought so hard to get Luke to even consider helping them, there was a tinge of something like frustration in her as well; were they just as furious with him as General Organa?  


  


"Han used to sit in this cockpit and stare off into space when he knew he was wrong, too."  


  
"Must be a flyboy thing."

  


  
"No. It was a matter of pride with him, just as it is with you. I asked you what you thought of Admiral Holdo and you told me that her penchant for heroism caused her to make the choices she did, but you're wrong. Those are _you're_ motivations. Your need to constantly prove yourself, to do one more crazy thing to be noticed and to be heard."

  


  
"It's cold out here."

  


  
"I know you're not talking about the tumultuous nature of the coastal weather on a secluded island, Poe. And I know the feeling."

  


  
The General is a woman who is known for her absolute strength, but when she sits down in what used to be Han Solo's pilot's seat, her shoulders slump forward. "You remind me so much of him. The emptiness of his loss, Ben's fall to the dark side - seeing Luke again is pushing me beyond what I thought I was capable of as a leader. As a woman. Do you understand?"

  


  
"I'm not a woman, General." Leia laughs, a sound from deep inside of her that bears no resemblance to humor. "No, you're not. You know I hold you to a different standard. It's because you are so much like Han that I know I can demand more from you, and perhaps where Admiral Holdo was concerned, I stretched those expectations too far."  


  


"Never, General." He's suddenly so afraid of disappointing her, this woman he has come to admire more than any other being in the galaxy. "I've always done what you've asked. Not a single question of your loyalty to our cause has ever entered my mind. I can't imagine what it must be like now, but - we're going to find Kylo, and he's going to come back. Rey will see to that."

  


  
"Rey is not the only key to finishing this fight and winning it, commander." His ears perk. "Ma'am?"

  


  
"Take your rank back, Poe. And please don't call me 'ma'am' when it's just the two of us in a dusty old cockpit."

  


  
A curious sensation creeps over Poe's tunic underneath the canvas utility jacket he's wearing. He's felt something growing inside of him since watching Leia's unconscious form in a medbay, fighting for her life after a miraculous recovery from being sent out into the vacuum of space. She shouldn't have survived, and he had been prepared to mourn her as he did all those he lost. She was wrong. She was wrong, and what he was feeling was anger that she would so easily dismiss his own grief.

  


  
"You know, you're not the only one." His voice cracks, he feels that telltale redness burn his cheeks. "You are wrong, because every decision I have made in that X-Wing was driven by a desire to help you. You're the one I want to see this thing through with. You're the one I want to impress; you're the only family I have anymore, the only home. Let yourself find that home in me too, and maybe rebuilding this Resistance and moving forward won't hurt for either of us so much."

  


  
Leia can't say what she was thinking in that moment; just that she was seized by a strong and inexplicable desire to kiss Poe Dameron. He bore no resemblance to her late husband, but he held within his dark eyes the intensity of Han, the sense of purpose even when he didn't understand how all the pieces fit.

  


  
"Leia, I -" she grasps either side of his face, gently guiding her lips to his. To her relief, he does not struggle against what turns out to be a chaste but somehow hungry kiss, ending with a run of her tongue across his lower lip.

  


  
"I shouldn't have done that."

  


  
"Done what?" There's mischief behind that statement. Leia leaves it alone, sullen after having been reckless and impulsive. Everyone thinks she mollycoddles Poe anyway, and if it's discovered that they were in the _Falcon_ together and alone for a long period of time, rumors will rightly fly.

  


  
She decides to take her chances. When was the last time she could say that anything belonged to her?

  


  
"I've wanted to do that since you pulled that stunt to destroy the _Fulminatrix_. But I settled on slapping you instead."

  


  
"You should have. Give those milquetoast admins something to talk about."

  


  
"Shut up."

  


He initiates this kiss, though Leia has found her way to straddling his lap in the pilot's chair. He vaguely wonders if it's sacrilege, what they're doing; he wonders if she ever made love to Han there. He wonders if it matters.

  


  
"It doesn't" she whispers. "Just hold me."

  


  
And he does. All night, in a cramped bed onboard the ship her husband flew.

  


* * *

****

  
"What is it with you and reckless pilots?"

  


  
Leia throws her hands in the air. "Who knows. He was there, looking vulnerable and handsome and stricken with grief. What was I supposed to do?"

  


  
"Leave him well enough alone, probably."

  


  
"He reminds me of Han."

  


  
"All the more reason to leave him be, Leia. You know he'll wind up smeared on the side of a meteor."

  


  
"Shut up." She's smiling, which is more than Luke can hope for. "I'm sorry about Han. I - hadn't felt it. But now I do, and I feel how lonely and searching you are. If you can do it all over again with another scruffy-looking nerf herder hotshot pilot, then do it. With my blessing."

  


  
"I'm old, Luke."

  


  
"Yes. We are old, but we're not dead. We carry ghosts, Leia, and sometimes we cannot find solace in their otherworldly embrace."

  


  
"You don't think I'm betraying Han's memory?"

  


  
"No, Leia. Not at all. This is about comfort, not love. If it does become about love, deal with it then. Think nothing more of it than finding comfort. You need that; you deserve it."

  


  
Luke watches his sister continue to walk forward, joining Finn, Rey, and Poe on a cliff sporting a breathtaking view of the ocean surrounding them as far as the eye could see. He smiles when his sister's hand, marked with age but still as lovely as the day he rescued her from the Death Star's detention block, grasp Poe's fingers.

  


  
The Resistance would survive. They had everything they needed.

  



End file.
